According to Irish Legend
by AndIllWriteYouATragedy
Summary: "According to Irish legend, the Gates of Heaven open at midnight on Christmas Eve." Castiel pays Dean, Sam, and Bobby a little Christmas visit.


**A/N: You know the Sounds of the Seasons channel? It plays during the holiday season on some nine-hundred channel, and plays all sorts of holiday music. The channel also displays fun facts and trivia about the holidays, and I saw one today that really got me thinking up a whole short storyline. It said **_**"According to Irish legend, the Gates of Heaven open at midnight on Christmas Eve." **_

**Just so you know, this is just like a totally separate storyline. Forget what you know about **_**Supernatural **_**plotlines. This is just if Sam and Dean wanted to celebrate Christmas with Cas, who is in Heaven, so Cas decides to pop down and celebrate when the Gates of Heaven open. **

**There are hints of an established relationship between Dean and Castiel. I do not own **_**Supernatural **_**or anything affiliated with it. Yet.**

**'So, without further gilding the lily and with no more ado, I give to you,' the (pretty short, pretty odd) story!**

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><p>"Dean, do you want to help me decorate or something?" Sam asked quietly, hanging old air fresheners off of the scrawny tree they chopped down in the woods behind Bobby's house and stuck in his living room. Dean looked up from the spot on the floor he'd been staring at and quickly looked away from his brother.<p>

"Nah, I'm good. Don't really feel like celebrating." Dean reached over blindly and lifted a bottle of beer off of the coffee table, flipping the cap off with ease and taking a long drink. Sam frowned.

"Bobby would like it if we decorated." Sam urged. Dean didn't look at his brother and stayed silent; Sam just sighed and went back to hanging the tree-shaped fresheners.

"Why can't Cas come back? Just for a day." Dean murmured angrily after a few moments of silence. He slammed the bottle back onto the table and leaned forward on the short sofa, putting his head in his hands and his elbows on his knees.

"He said he had things to take care of." Sam shrugged and hung the last "ornament". "I'm sure he'll be back at some point."

"Well, he should hurry the hell up." Dean lifted his head from his hands and looked up at the ceiling, like Cas was listening to him. "You hear that, you feathery asshole?"

"He's probably not listening, Dean. There's no point in getting angry about it." Sam moved away from the tree and started rummaging through the fridge.

"I'm always listening, Sam." A gruff voice told him from the corner of the room. Sam jumped a foot in the air, and Dean's head snapped towards the noise.

"Cas." Dean breathed, seeming almost like he didn't believe that Cas was really there. "What're you doing here?"

"I've been stuck in Heaven, Dean. I am so sorry that I haven't been answering you." Cas crossed to Dean, thoroughly ignoring Sam, who was standing in the doorway between the kitchen and the living room.

"Stuck in Heaven?" Sam asked, almost incredulous. He was protective of his brother just as his brother was protective of him; anyone who upset Dean had to deal with Sam first.

"They're trying to keep all the angels there, creating an army. They locked the Gates of Heaven. But it's Christmas Eve." Cas turned to look at Sam as though he wished the brother would go away and leave him and Dean alone for a moment. "Surely you know what that means, Sam."

"No, I don't, Cas. But why don't you enlighten me?" Sam replied shortly. Dean looked up at his brother.

"The Gates of Heaven open on Christmas Eve, Sammy." Dean told him. His cheeks darkened slightly when both Cas and Dean looked at him with confusion. "So? I've been trying to find a way for Cas to come on Christmas. Stop looking at me like I grew boobs."

"Dean." Cas exhaled. "I didn't...I...I...I didn't know, I..."

"Calm down, Cas. Don't worry about it. You're here now, ain't you?" Dean leaned forward to grab his beer off the table and take a drink from it, trying to lose the ridiculous blush in his cheeks, or at least blame it on alcohol instead of emotion.

"Yes, I am here." Cas sat down on the sofa beside Dean and put his hand on the hunter's knee. Dean looked away from his bottle with surprise, first at the angel and then down at the hand. "I will not go back unless forced to do so."

"I believe you." Dean set the bottle back on the table and got up, stepping around Cas to the skimpy tree. He bent down and dug two sloppily wrapped gifts out from under it. "I'll give Bobby his later, but I want you two to open yours now in case Cas gets...Just open them."

Dean tossed a thick, rectangular package to Sam and a much smaller, squarer package to Cas. Sam smiled at his brother and immediately tore into his, revealing a heavy leather-bound book. He lifted the latch and opened the book, flipping through the pages with growing confusion. He looked back up at Dean.

"What's this?" he asked. Dean went to stand beside his brother, opening to the first page.

"Read that first, dumbass." Dean told him, the insult light. The wind howled outside with the growing snowstorm. Sam read the page speedily, his grin growing as he did.

"Dean, this is amazing, thank you!" Sam exclaimed, throwing his arms around his brother. Dean patted his brother on the back.

"What is it?" Cas asked curiously, standing up and clutching his own present from Dean in his fist.

"It's a journal. Dean wrote the best thing I did every day in it." Sam flipped through the book again eagerly, stopping now and then to read one of the short entries. "Dean, how old is this?"

"Mom helped me start it when you were born. I finally filled it a few weeks ago." Dean told him, reaching over and turning to the second page after the note. "See? First day you were alive, you looked at me." Dean looked up at his tall brother. "You were pretty boring for a few weeks there."

"Understandably. I was a newborn infant." Sam teased, shoving his brother. Dean smiled and turned to Cas. "Open yours, Cas, don't just stand there."

Cas looked down at the terribly wrapped box in his hands and pulled the wrapping off, revealing a beaten-down box of probably fake velvet. His brow furrowed in curiosity as he pried open the lid. "It's a ring."

"You can wear it and you'll always remember us." Dean told him, the silent _"But especially me."_ hung in the air between them, unnoticed by Sam. "Read what it says. Burned it in myself."

"It says **Winchester **on the inside." Cas commented, pulling the ring from the box and slipping it onto his left ring finger.

"Cas, that's not the right finger, that's the finger you put your wedding band on." Sam told him. Cas looked up at him, making a face.

"I'd like to put the ring on the ring finger that symbolizes a union, thank you, Sam." Cas replied before returning to ignoring Cas in favor of paying more attention to Dean. "I shall keep it with me always, Dean. I like it very much. Thank you."

"Don't worry about it, Cas. Just keep it with you." Dean's face was brighter red, happy that Cas wanted to keep it there on his left ring finger; he turned it away from the angel to look at his brother. "Merry Christmas, Sam."

"Merry Christmas, Dean." Sam smiled and turned to Castiel. "Merry Christmas, Cas."

"Merry Christmas, Sam." Cas took a couple steps forward to Dean. "I didn't bring you anything, Dean. I did not think to."

"Don't worry about it, Cas, I don't need anything." Dean told him, almost becoming cross-eyed from the closeness of the angel, but forgetting to remind him about personal space.

"But I want to give you something." Cas took one more step forward and pressed his lips to Dean's. Dean's eyes flew open and immediately darted to Sam, who was staring open-mouthed like a cartoon character.

"Jesus, Cas, you don't just kiss a man in front of his brother!" Sam exclaimed loudly, tripping backwards and almost running into Bobby, who shouted "Whoa!" as soon as he saw what was going on in his living room. Cas pulled back from Dean, who was looking bewildered, and looked at Sam and Bobby with confusion.

"Is that not a good gift?" Cas asked. Sam stammered and Bobby just looked like he wanted to disappear back to wherever he'd come from. Dean blinked a couple times.

"I liked it." Dean announced, leaning in to kiss Cas again. Sam laughed with surprise, but Bobby just turned around and left like he'd never been there.

"Merry Christmas, Dean." Cas told him in his deep voice. Dean grinned and grabbed the angel's trench coat.

"Merry Christmas, you sexy son of a bitch."


End file.
